Doctor Strange is a bit of a hard sell. Never one of Marvel's sexier characters, the hero known as Earth's Sorcerer Supreme often starred in stories that veered into the existential and psychedelic; throwing around abstract concepts like astral projections and other planes of existence and other things beyond comprehensions. Doctor Strange is also a familiar sell—like Iron Man, or Thor, he's an arrogant man of great skill and talent humbled by circumstance, given the opportunity to become something else entirely and hopefully learn a lesson or two about selflessness along the way.

Our first look at Doctor Strange, however, lines its pitch right down the middle—we meet Benedict Cumberbatch's Stephen Strange (with what sounds like a strange, gravel-y American accent) as a gifted surgeon who suffers a car accident that effectively shatters his hands. He somehow meets The Ancient One (Tilda Swinton, who contains multitudes) who teaches him about "other ways to save people," by which she presumably means magic.

Magic, in this film, seems to involve turning the world around you into a Cubist kaleidoscope. I'm kind of into it?

Thus far, Marvel has had a pretty great track record at taking characters no one has any business caring about and turning them into likable action heroes that people will come back for again and again. And look—maybe it's getting harder and harder to believe that no one gave a shit about Star-Lord before Guardians of the Galaxy came out—but until very recently Doctor Strange had very little going for him outside of his rad taste in outerwear.

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